Music for Palm Sunday

This liturgy of Palm Sunday balances the simultaneity of two disparate atmospheres: one of rejoicing as Jesus the celebrated prophet enters into Jerusalem; and one of foreboding as the gospel’s narrative leads one to contemplate his sacrifice on the cross.

We begin with the spirit of celebration, as the Carnival Band accompanies our Procession of the Palms, as we sing the traditional processional hymns All glory, laud, and honour and Ride on, ride on in majesty. As we enter the church, the psalm and the tract foreshadow the imminent themes of Holy Week, imploring God’s help in times of deepest trouble.

The words of the communion motet invite reflection on the entire purpose for Christ’s Passion: that through his death on the cross, God exalted Jesus to be above any other who had lived and walked on earth. As it so happens, the artistic aesthetics popular in Felice Anerio’s lifetime were perfectly suited to highlight such contrasts, perhaps most popularly exemplified in the chiaro-oscuro style of Caravaggio and other tenebrists. In this period, a religious painting or piece of music was designed to transport the listener to a state of sympathetic emotion whereby they might experience the phenomena described by a text through affected musical depiction. Anerio breaks a chief rule of counterpoint on the first two notes of his motet, writing the dissonant interval of a major second, which pulls us into the realization of Christ’s suffering before resolving into a glorious sequence of fifths on the text “gave him the name above all names.”

The recessional hymn is one that I personally cherish, a tune which English scholar Erik Routley deemed “safe to call one of the greatest twentieth-century hymn tunes.” Richard Dirksen composed “Vineyard Haven” on the occasion of Bishop Allin’s induction at the American National Cathedral in 1974, after which time it quickly garnered popularity as a centrepiece of our North-American Anglican tradition.

 Abraham Ross

Solemn Mass takes place at St. James’ Anglican Church, Vancouver at 10:30 am every Sunday.